In an earlier post I noted that a partial solution to the climate crisis is large scale investments in capital-intensive green energy projects, particularly in developing countries. This provides an opportunity for middle-aged savers in high income countries, so long as their savings are productively invested.
This is where New Zealand has an issue.
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Once again, Rio Tinto is threatening to shut down Tiwai Point in order to gain concessions. Ultimately, government isn’t supporting the smelter because we care about Rio Tinto – but because we care about the workers and their opportunities in life.
This reminds me of a post from 2013 which I would like to repeat here – it was originally posted on interest.co.nz here.
Read moreNew Zealand is in the process of commemorating, commiserating and/or celebrating James Cook’s first voyage to New Zealand in 1769. New Zealand was merely one stop on his trip, albeit a lengthy one, which proceeded onwards to Australia, Java (where nearly a third of the crew died from dysentery), Cape Town and back to England. It was the 25th circumnavigation of the world.
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In this post I am going to discuss how a change in labour force growth can explain firms’ entry/ exit rates. Recent findings by Hopenhayn et al (2018) for the US motivated me to think about this relationship in a NZ context.
Furthermore, the authors linked these entry and exit rates to “dynamism” and therefore productivity growth – a link I wanted to think about a bit more carefully.
Read moreThis article was originally posted at Interest.co.nz in 2013. The ideas are timeless 😉
Imagine being able to print your own currency.
Click a button, add a few zeros and voila you’ve increased the money supply.
The Reserve Bank can do it, and, believe it or not in a similar vein so too can Air New Zealand.
Read moreIn a recent response to questions, The Reserve Bank of Australia has listed six options of unconventional monetary policy that is considered in an event of extreme policy implementation. Westpac economists have also talked about potential unconventional monetary policy tools applicable to the NZ case here – this is worth a read, but is a different list!
In this post I would like to outline the RBA’s options and hopefully make them easy to understand.
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